Re:Ant Lord-Chapter 157: Blood and Bonds

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Symbols of domination. Symbols of war. Symbols of rulership.

Kai slammed his spear into the ground. The earth trembled as though the mountain remembered who it now belonged to.

He drew in one full breath, deep, and final and his heart now glowing. He unleashed his second Ruler’s Roar.

The world broke.

Not with sound.

But with silence.

A silence so absolute it consumed noise. Erased it. Drowned it in something older than death. The air didn’t move, it vanished.

The shockwave surged out like a scarlet tide, not pushing but devouring. Stone cracked and vaporized. Silver mist shredded into ribbons, then into threads, then into nothing.

Half the savage rabbit clan ceased to exist. Not slain. Not injured. Simply gone.

Their bodies turned to dust mid-scream, shredded into black sand that scattered on invisible winds.

The six star rank guardian staggered, the orb of death it had been conjuring folding in on itself, then collapsing like a black hole of failed ambition.

Its massive limb, a bone-talon hybrid of fossil and fury crumbled to ash.

Then came the screaming. From its fused mouths. Dozens of voices crying at once with rage, agony, and fear.

One last crack ran down its bulk. Then the entire creature burst into pale light.

Thousands of trapped souls released at once, blooming in a slow, gentle nova that painted the sky in candle-like motes. For a breathless moment, it looked like fireflies floating in snowfall.

And then they were gone. All of them. When the silence finally lifted, not a single threat remained.

Only charred rock, fractured terrain, and Kai was standing at the center of it all, steam rising off his shoulders, the shaft of his spear still embedded in the stone.

His body trembled. His knees ached. But he stood.

Kai blinked. His vision blurred, not from weakness, but from the sheer emptiness left by such a violent outpouring of power.

His aura dimmed to a simmer. His pulse slowed down barely. Only a whisper echoed through the system’s notifications:

[Ruler’s Roar is used. Only 1 charge of Ruler’s Roar remaining.]

And Kai knew, that the night was far from over.

The silence after the Ruler’s Roar didn’t last.

It shattered like glass beneath a hammer as new auras slammed into the clearing, one from the right, silver mist twisting through the air like liquid moonlight, and the other from the left, crackling green fire like a blade dragged across dry wood.

Kai’s body tensed.

He didn’t have the energy to speak, his breath still fought to catch up to his heartbeat but his senses flared, registering threat before thought.

"Kai, are you okay?!" Luna’s voice cut across the battlefield, frantic and sharp. She stood on a high ledge, one hand gripping the side of a crumbling ridge, the other shielding Miryam who peeked out from her sling, but her eyes were closed.

Skyweaver floated just behind them, silver sensors flaring, while Shadeclaw crouched protectively, his tail flicking like a whip in warning.

From the cliff on the left, one of the charging figures stumbled in mid step.

"Wait—" Vexor gasped, blinking rapidly.

He stared across the battlefield, his green glinting visor catching the light. Then he looked at Luna, looked again at the figure in the center of the scorched zone.

The spear. The broken terrain. The aura... the look in Luna’s eyes and the name that came out of her mouth, Kai!

"Kai?! Is that you? You didn’t die?!" Vexor yelled in disbelief, then burst into a run, shouting back over his shoulder, "Princess Mia will go crazy when she hears! He’s alive!"

Shale landed beside him with a heavy thud, gripping his curved blade but not raising it. His voice was soft, stunned. "A team searched the dune Dead Ridge for weeks... but they didn’t find him. Now, there he is, standing in human form. I can’t believe my eyes."

Needle muttered behind them, "He looks different. He is stronger than before. Too strong."

Flint, ever the quiet one, stared in reverence. "It’s like looking at a legend still bleeding."

The Dawn Blade squad clustered together, their disbelief swelling into collective awe. Excitement crackled in their voices.

"He’s real."

"He’s alive."

"We’ll bring him back. Princess Mia has been waiting for him."

"She cried when she gave up the search."

"She’ll cry again when he walks into the citadel gates."

But Kai didn’t move. Not even a blink. He stood silently. His body rigid, shoulders tense. Still in the grip of Ruler’s Roar’s aftermath.

Emotion warred behind his eyes: fury, exhaustion, restraint. His knuckles whitened around his spear. The energy he had poured into the attack had burned more than his strength, it had scorched something inside him. A piece of restraint he couldn’t afford to lose.

And then... The enemy moved.

From the opposite cliff, Thea’s Shadow Talon squad surged forward. Fewer than before, one got injured under the guardian’s wrath but what remained was deadly and burning for war.

At their lead, Grev howled like a beast, obsidian scythes slicing arcs of fury through the air. "For Lady Thea!" he bellowed. "Take his head! That transform ant filth is Mia’s pet—let’s crush her hope! Kill them all! Kill Mia’s squad, the rabbit whore, and that beasts with him! When we get back, we’ll say it was mercy. She’ll thank us."

Behind him, Sil leapt high, trailing a fog of reflective dust that warped light into dancing ghost blades. They shimmered with illusions of death without weight, form without flesh, but still dangerously sharp.

Their intent was unmistakable. Assassinate Kai. Slaughter the Mia’s Dawn Blade squad. End the story before it reached the Ant kingdom.

Steel answered steel.

Shale, Vexor, Needle, and Flint vaulted down the ledge as one, blades unsheathed, armor igniting with squad sigils. They didn’t hesitate.

They’d trained for this moment their entire lives. Dawn Blade squad steel met Shadow squad with Talon obsidian in a chaotic collision.

The air screamed with sparks.

Shale’s sword locked with Grev’s twin scythes, feet grinding against stone as the two tanks clashed with a force that shook the ledge. Needle spun behind Shale’s shoulder, daggers humming with poison. Flint ducked low, parrying an illusion blade from Sil, his green eyes narrowed with precision focus.